'To the Lighthouse' by Virginia Woolf: Contemporary Reviews (1927)


Read by Phil Benson

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Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse was published in May 1927 in both Britain and the United States. The publication of Mrs. Dalloway a year earlier had secured Virginia Woolf's reputation as an experimental writer. To the Lighthouse was, consequently, widely reviewed in the British and American press in the months following its publication. Most reviewers praised Mrs. Woolf's genius, although they found evidence of it in varied aspects of the book. For some, the book was a flawed masterpiece, although they did not agree on what the flaws were. A few recalcitrant reviewers failed to see anything of significance in Woolf's new book at all. This collection of contemporary reviews, by reviewers including Louis Kronenberger, Conrad Aiken, Edwin Muir, Zona Gale, Ruth Sucknow and Arnold Bennett, is sourced from the Woolf Online web site. It includes standalone reviews of To the Lighthouse, extracts from longer reviews of new fiction, and in the last section, Edwin Clark's full New York Times review of new fiction published in the first half of the year. Listeners may be surprised at just how varied 30 reviews of a single book can be! (Summary by Phil Benson) (3 hr 3 min)

Chapters

Mrs. Woolf's New Novel, The Times Literary Supplement 7:37 Read by Phil Benson
Virginia Woolf Explores an English Country Home, Louis Kronenberger, The New Yo… 12:48 Read by Phil Benson
From Virginia Woolf and Others, Rachel A. Taylor, The Spectator 5:45 Read by Phil Benson
The Novel as Work of Art, Conrad Aiken, The Dial 11:01 Read by Phil Benson
Sensitives, A. M., The Manchester Guardian 3:13 Read by Phil Benson
Review, Edwin Muir, The Nation and Athenaeum 4:09 Read by Phil Benson
Woman as Artist, Mary M. Colum, The New York Herald Tribune 22:19 Read by Phil Benson
An Allegorical Novel, Francis Brown, The Daily Herald 2:15 Read by Phil Benson
From The Editor Recommends, The Bookman 2:21 Read by Phil Benson
Unsigned Review, The English Review 1:54 Read by Phil Benson
Unsigned Review, The New Age 1:50 Read by Phil Benson
Review, C. S. & M. A., The Bookshelf 2:15 Read by Phil Benson
From Books and Persons, Arnold Bennett, The Evening Standard 3:42 Read by Phil Benson
The Cauldron of Perception, Zona Gale, The Saturday Review of Literature 7:01 Read by Phil Benson
From Notes on Recent Books, Elizabeth Brown Cutting, The North American Review 3:03 Read by Phil Benson
From Mr. Chesterton and Others, Gerald Gould, The Observer 2:27 Read by Phil Benson
Lyrical Fiction, The Glasgow Herald 3:14 Read by Phil Benson
Nothing is simply one: Virginia Woolf’s surprising new story, Lydia Languish, J… 7:34 Read by Phil Benson
Done in the Round, Mary Ross, The Nation 4:35 Read by Phil Benson
Poetic fiction: Mrs. Virginia Woolf’s novel experiment, The Morning Post 4:35 Read by Phil Benson
From Novels and Stories, M. Robinson, The New Adelphi 5:21 Read by Phil Benson
Unsigned Review, Punch 1:49 Read by Phil Benson
Review, F. W. K., The Sewanee Review 5:17 Read by Phil Benson
Review, John Sydenham, The Empire Review 7:25 Read by Phil Benson
Unsigned Review, The Bookman 2:50 Read by Phil Benson
Mrs. Woolf's Way, Time Magazine 4:06 Read by Phil Benson
Unsigned Review, Country Life 2:29 Read by Phil Benson
Civilized people in life and fiction, Charles R. Walker, The Independent 8:10 Read by Phil Benson
From New Fiction, T. Earle Welby, The Saturday Review 6:04 Read by Phil Benson
Six months in the field of fiction, Edwin Clark, The New York Times 26:40 Read by Phil Benson